Themes in Edgar Allan Poe's Work
poe
Edgar Allan Poe is one of those writers who try to horrify us about what is out there, as well as making us conscious of the terror within. He takes the readers to the exterior and gradually moves into the interior, as he talks about not what you are frightened off but the fear itself. These ideas are hindered upon through the short stories ‘The Murder in the Rue Morgue”, “The Man in the crowd” and “The Tell Tale Heart” as these were one of the first detective stories. Through these short stories Poe took the process of using clues to figure out the identity of a criminal and made the protagonist look at all the evidence and reason his way to the answer.
Fear is referred to the feeling of agitation and anxiety caused by the presence or imminence of danger, thus terror is the intense, overpowering fear (The free dictionary). Fear can be rational or legitimate which makes people susceptible towards it. This is referred to Edgar Allan Poe, as he is one of those writers who try to terrify us about what is out there all the while making us aware of the terror within. He was a gothic writer that introduced detective stories. This style of writing may be due to Poe’s personal experience as a child and as an adult. Other stories that hinder on this idea is the short story “Terrors of the Modern-All Souls” by Jacqueline Wilson-Jordan, refers to terror in the exterior and also interior, “Chronicles a middle-aged woman’s thirty-six hour odyssey of terror as she limps alone through her New England mansion, searching in vain for her missing servants and any sign of life”(Wilson-Jordon 66). This quote refers to the fear that the women has, as she is afraid of death personally and how the exterior cannot really protect her. This includes her wealth or her servants. This idea is also emphasized through the short story “The breath of the devils: Memories and Places of an experience of Terror” as it examines how an indigenous group of the Argentine Chaco re-members
Edgar Allan Poe is one of those writers who try to horrify us about what is out there, as well as making us conscious of the terror within. He takes the readers to the exterior and gradually moves into the interior, as he talks about not what you are frightened off but the fear itself. These ideas are hindered upon through the short stories ‘The Murder in the Rue Morgue”, “The Man in the crowd” and “The Tell Tale Heart” as these were one of the first detective stories. Through these short stories Poe took the process of using clues to figure out the identity of a criminal and made the protagonist look at all the evidence and reason his way to the answer.
Fear is referred to the feeling of agitation and anxiety caused by the presence or imminence of danger, thus terror is the intense, overpowering fear (The free dictionary). Fear can be rational or legitimate which makes people susceptible towards it. This is referred to Edgar Allan Poe, as he is one of those writers who try to terrify us about what is out there all the while making us aware of the terror within. He was a gothic writer that introduced detective stories. This style of writing may be due to Poe’s personal experience as a child and as an adult. Other stories that hinder on this idea is the short story “Terrors of the Modern-All Souls” by Jacqueline Wilson-Jordan, refers to terror in the exterior and also interior, “Chronicles a middle-aged woman’s thirty-six hour odyssey of terror as she limps alone through her New England mansion, searching in vain for her missing servants and any sign of life”(Wilson-Jordon 66). This quote refers to the fear that the women has, as she is afraid of death personally and how the exterior cannot really protect her. This includes her wealth or her servants. This idea is also emphasized through the short story “The breath of the devils: Memories and Places of an experience of Terror” as it examines how an indigenous group of the Argentine Chaco re-members
Bibliography: * Gordillo, Gordon. "The breath of the devils: memories and places of an experience of terror." American Ethnologist (2002): 33. * poe, edgar allan. selected tales. new york: david van leer, 1998. * Wilson-Jordon, Jacueline. "Terrors of the modern world:Edith Wharton 's 'All Souls ' as a Kevisionist Gothic Tale." Academic Journal (2008): 66. * the free dictionary